Posts by Bart Janssen
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Steve Barnes,
And this policy is based on what exactly?
Nah I think they basically thought asking folks to walk through a cloud of smoke to get into a public building was just rude. Since the smokers didn't seem to understand that they legislated it. Made the centre of town a remarkably pleasant place to wander since you didn't have the experience of walking into someone else's cloud of smoke.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to DCBCauchi,
That is because it is.
Huh?
You seem to be suggesting I'm an authoritarian. My stance is that folks should be educated, so they know what does them harm, they should be free to do things that do them harm if they so choose, but that they should be asked to set aside money to pay for their care if said harm occurs.
I don't believe ACC should bear all the cost. Nor do I believe making commercialization illegal is a good idea because it is just too close to prohibition to work well. I understand Mikaere's point about not trusting business since their goal is to make money but that's why you have a strong Com Com. Business is not inherently bad, having selfish pricks without any conscience in business is the problem.
On balance I'll keep my high ideals.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
So why don’t we tax alcohol on exactly the same basis as tobacco, again?
I'm guessing to do that we'd need vertebrates in parliament.
But yes I'd agree, a higher tax/duty on alcohol is warranted.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
in that delightfully high minded statement
you say that like it's a bad thing
Sugar yes - pretty easy to show that high sugar concentrations in food are bad and ought to be taxed to buggery
Dairy is more problematic the evidence is confused at best with those bloody french demonstrating that eating cheese is good for you.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Russell Brown,
I’ll also be talking to Mike Joy
ooo ooo ask him how he felt about being compared to a lawyer by a politician
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Mikaere Curtis,
I’m not so inclined to consider caveat emptor to be a sufficient mechanism to prevent harm. For substances that, when used responsibly, usually have minimal harm, then sure. But for substances like tobacco (and pokies, for that matter), all the warnings in the world can’t help you once you are addicted. For this kind of drug, you need to deal with the drivers of updake – which means the nearly ubiquitous nature of tobacco supply in our community. I would prefer to see it illegal to sell or import for supply, but legal to possess and legal to grow.
The problem with that approach is that there will be some who do themselves harm. In the society I want to live in we will care for them within the public health system. Personally I'd like some of the cost of that care paid for by the user in the form of taxes or duties. Tax and duty also allows a reasonably easy way of moderating use - again for tobacco increasing the cost to the user is the single most effective way of reducing use. If you make it illegal to sell you lose that tool.
public spaces is exactly where smokers congregate nowadays
You missed the word essentially. Personally I would go for the rule they have in Davis CA, where you can't smoke within 50 feet of the entrance to a public building. Which means that you can't smoke anywhere in the centre of town. It will happen in NZ eventually.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Russell Brown,
For sure. Ideally, there would be an "at your own reasonable risk" standard -- with a requirement that risks be made explicitly clear -- and a pretty tight rein on means of sale.
Essentially this is what we do with tobacco and alcohol. We could do it better with alcohol but that's another discussion. This is also the point where I disagree with Ms Turia and her plan to ban tobacco. I'd imagine a situation where drugs were graded on their health risk and labelled accordingly. Sale of those drugs would be subject to taxation, duties and regulation. Use of those drugs would be restricted to non-public places, essentially the same as you see for tobacco now.
Basically if you plan on taking drugs in your own home the state doesn't care, providing the duties and taxes associated cover the health costs to keep you alive.
Then you could spend money on realistic education of children to make sure they understand.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Russell Brown,
induces people to vocalise their inner monologue
You mean like blogging?
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So the compelling thing for me is that we've been treating drug users as criminals for several decades and it hasn't stopped people using drugs. Worse it hasn't stopped people being harmed.
So can we please stop doing something that doesn't work and try doing something different. It's pretty much the definition of stupidity to keep repeating the same actions year after year and expecting a different outcome.
There are no guarantees that trying something new like legalisation and education to try and avoid harm from drugs. But we know beyond any shadow of a doubt that our current approach fails.
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Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to Rich Lock,
90% of the world’s poppies for heroin production are grown there, so under the current mindset of western governments, it’s logical for them to be there
Someone did a study that showed a very nice inverse correlation between grain prices and opium production. Essentially if the Afghani growers can get a decent price for grain they will switch from poppies to grain.
Logically a trade subsidy for grain from Afghanistan would seriously damage opium production and be much cheaper than using guns.